The Land of Painted Caves - Jean M. Auel [268]
The floor was hard stone, calcite, and the left wall was blocked by white-and-orange-colored columns. Once past the columns, there were almost no concretions except for the ceiling, which held strange rounded stone shapes and reddish deposits. The floor was full of pieces of stone of every size that had fallen from the ceiling. A somewhat circular area was broken by the fall of a heavy fragment from above, which caused a tilt in the floor. Near the entrance, on a rock pendant was a small, rudimentary sketch in red of a mammoth.
Beyond that, high up on the wall was a small red bear. It was apparent that the artist had to climb up the wall to paint it. Below it, on a rock sticking out of the wall, were two mammoths that utilized the relief of rock wall, and beyond it on another protrusion was a strange sign. On the opposite wall was an extraordinary panel of red paintings, which included the forequarters of a well-made bear. The shape of the forehead and the way the head was carried identified it as a cave bear.
“Jonokol, doesn’t this bear look very much like the red bear we just saw?” Ayla asked.
“Yes, it does. I suspect it was made by the same person,” he said.
“But I don’t understand the rest of the painting. It’s like two different animals joined together so that it seems to have two heads, one of them coming out of the chest of the bear, but then there’s a lion in the middle, and another lion head in front of the bear. I don’t understand this painting at all,” Ayla said.
“Perhaps it’s not meant to be understood by anyone but the one who made it. The artist used a lot of imagination, and may have been trying to tell a story that is not known anymore. There are no Elder Legends or Histories that I know of to explain it,” the First said.
“I think we just have to appreciate the quality of the work,” the Watcher said, “and let the Ancients keep their secrets.”
Ayla nodded agreement. She had seen enough caves now to know that it wasn’t so much how the images looked when they were done as what the artists accomplished while they were making the art. Farther into the gallery, beyond the second lion head and a fault in the wall was a panel painted with black: the head of a lion, a big mammoth, and finally a figure painted high above the floor on a pendant hanging from the ceiling; it was a large red bear, its back outlined with black. The mystery was how the artist painted it. It was easily visible from the floor, but whoever made it had to climb over many high concretions to reach it.
“Did you notice that all the animals are going out of the room, except for the mammoth?” Jonokol said. “It’s as if they are coming into this world from the place of the spirit world.”
The Watcher stood just outside the room they had been in and started humming again, but this time it was similar to the melody of the music of the Mother’s Song the way the First sang it. Every Cave of the Zelandonii sang or recited the Mother’s Song. It told the story of their beginnings, of the origin of the people, and while they were all similar and told the same story, each Cave’s version was not exactly the same. That was especially true if they sang it. The melodies of the songs were often quite different, sometimes depending on who did the singing. Because she had been endowed with such an extraordinary voice, the First had composed her own unique way of singing it.
As if on signal, the First picked up the next verse of the Mother’s Song from where she left off. Both Jonokol and Ayla refrained from joining in, and just enjoyed listening.
In violent labor spewing fire and strife,
She struggled in pain to give birth to new life.
Her dried clotted blood turned to red-ochered soil,
But the radiant child made it all worth the toil.
The Mother’s great joy. A bright shining boy.
Mountains rose up spouting flames from their crests,
She nurtured Her son from Her mountainous breasts.
He suckled so hard, the sparks flew so high,
The Mother’s hot milk laid a path through the sky.
His life had begun. She nourished Her son.
He laughed and